Man charged after child porn found in 'gingerbread treehouse'

Mar 20, 2018

(STORY IMAGE:KHQ.COM)

KING COUNTY, Wash. -A Department of Natural Resources worker searching for a rumored "gingerbread treehouse" in the Snoqualmie National Forest found the house. Inside it was a cache of child porn that led to a man's arrest.

The man, identified as 56-year-old Daniel M. Wood, is facing child pornography charges in King County Superior Court after a lengthy FBI investigation tied him to the treehouse and found more child pornography in his Mill Creek home.

The Seattle Times reports a summons was issued for Wood to appear in court next week, and he's been ordered not to have any contact with minors.

According to court documents, the DNR employee said he'd heard about the treehouse for years and tried to find it five different times. He finally found it in November 2016. He described it as “an elaborate treehouse that resembled a fairy or gingerbread house” about 8 feet off the ground. It was built illegally on federal land in the Snoqualmie National Forest.

A search and rescue volunteer who knew the area well told investigators that he had come across the cabin several times, and that he'd seen a Toyota FJ Cruiser parked nearby. He took down the license number for the Toyota and investigators were able to track it to Wood's house, the documents said.

Investigators gathered DNA evidence from a motorcycle parked outside Wood's house and from a cup they saw him drinking from, and matched that to DNA inside the treehouse.

Investigators were able to get a search warrant for Wood's house. In it, they found an SD car that contained "thousands of images of child erotica and child pornography," according to the documents. Among those images were photos of young girls inside the treehouse.